Thursday, 12 June 2014

Revell US Infantry Heavy Weapons

Here are the heavy weapons from the Revell US Infantry set. Most Revell sets seem to include some form of multiple base with a heavy weapon and crew on it, and in this set there are two, a .50cal and Mortar (and two of each to boot!).

Apart from both being woefully under-manned (one man to run a mortar, really?), which is pretty normal for most sets of model soldier, these two are really rather good. The weapons are nicely detailed (the mortar bomb actually looks like one, which is rare). the .50cal in particular is outstanding, the ammo belt the loader is feeding twists in a nicely realistic way, and his Garand and water bottle are on the ground in front of him. There are even spent shell cases moulded onto the base to the right of the gun itself (although you can't really see them in the photos).

The only downside is that, being made from the usual Revell Soft plastic, assembly was a bit of a pain, even superglue doesn't like sticking these together and the mortar stand particularly had a tendency to try and bend away from wherever I was trying to put it!

Good suggestion, the marching guy in the greatcoat might work carrying ammo (just need to work out what the US carried their mortar shells in). I also should have some matchbox figs somewhere that might do the job, just need to find them.

You've made these up really nicely. My only criticism of the Revell .50 cal model is that the tripod doesn't look all that great. Also, apart from vehicle mounts the .50 cal MG does not appear in the TOE of many US units, although in theory all vehicles so equipped also carried the ground mount.

One point of interest - the Revell ammo handler fits well with the very common water-cooled Browning found in the Esci US infantry set, which looks much better with a proper two man crew after cutting away the belt and/or ammo box from the firing figure.

Plenty of actual (and potential) extra mortar crew in the new PSC US Heavy Weapons set, though not sure how good their chunky sculpts would look with the Revell guys:http://www.plasticsoldierreview.com/FirstLook.aspx?id=2412

Thanks Dave. One .50cal per heavy weapons company as I understand it. I reckon I can get away with the occasional one in a static defence role. Trouble is I've got four of the blighters!

Haven't got any Esci chaps at the moment, but I do have some spare .30 cals: 1919s on tripods from the Italeri anti tank teams (the gunners became spare loaders for my airborne mortars) and a couple of 1917s from Caesar. There's a bit of height difference, so I may have to improvise some reason to raise the guns, maybe a scenic base of a hasty improvised position. If I manage it I'll post.